Pairings in CIRCL

The text discusses the release of an updated version of CIRCL, an open-source cryptographic library written in Go. This new version includes additional packages for elliptic curve-based cryptography (ECC), pairing-based cryptography, and quantum-resistant algorithms. It also provides a detailed overview of pairing-based cryptography, its applications, and the mathematics behind it. The author explains how pairings are used in various cryptographic protocols such as identity-based encryption, short signature schemes, zk-SNARKS, and more. Furthermore, the text delves into the implementation details of CIRCL's pairing functionality, including formally verified arithmetic using fiat-crypto, tower field arithmetic, optimizations for the Miller loop and final exponentiation, product of pairings, subgroup membership testing, and hash to curve algorithms. The author encourages readers to use their updated library and provides a link for more information on CIRCL's other available primitives.